Derrick Nix's judgment and timing ridiculously bad, but punishment shouldn't include dismissal from Michigan State basketball program

View full sizeAP PhotoWhether suspended center Derrick Nix wears a Michigan State jersey again hasn't been announced by coach Tom Izzo.

EAST LANSING — At some point fairly soon, Michigan State coach Tom Izzo will have more to say publicly regarding scorned center Derrick Nix.

Perhaps a decision on the suspended junior's future with the basketball program. Or guidelines for reinstatement, following his arrest a week ago for marijuana possession and operating a vehicle with the presence of drugs.

The question now is, what will Izzo do with Nix? Or, for those of us living our lives covering or following this band of teenagers and barely 20-somethings, what should he do?

Izzo's only public comments thus far came about 12 hours after the arrest, when Izzo suspended Nix and issued a statement in which he made clear Nix's future with the program was in "serious jeopardy."

If this is truly a blip for Nix, his first legal screw-up with marijuana and first negative test of anything other than Izzo's patience — the Spartans' coach has said many times that he nearly gave up on Nix as a player two
years ago and, it should be noted, the results of random NCAA-mandated
drug tests are never made public — then Nix shouldn't be dismissed for this colossal mistake.

Derrick Nix

There are several factors to consider here, including precedent, severity of the crime and fairness.

Let's begin with precedent, looking back at Izzo's first such quandary in 1998, when sophomore Mateen Cleaves, then 20, and freshman Andre Hutson, 19, were arrested on alcohol charges in late February.

Both were sitting in a parked car hours after a win over Michigan. Cleaves, the team's star point guard, was charged with minor in possession of alcohol, refusing a breath test and a seat belt violation.

If it had been any other college student, a tough call home to mom might have been about the worst of it — just like with most marijuana citations. But this was Cleaves and the Spartans were one win from clinching a share of their first Big Ten title under Izzo.

View full sizeAP PhotoMichigan State coach Tom Izzo, right, said last week that the future of Derrick Nix, left, in the Spartan basketball program was uncertain. Nix was said to be shaken and apologetic after his arrest on marijuana charges while operating a vehicle.

The situations aren't dissimilar, though, from a media and fan perspective, the advancement of the internet age has made us even more
carnivorous (This is the seventh story we've done on Nix since his
arrest last week.).

Fourteen years ago, Cleaves and Hutson each missed one half of one game at Wisconsin. Any more and Izzo would probably have one less Big Ten title. The Spartans trailed the Badgers by seven at halftime (before Cleaves checked in) and won by nine.

The punishment seemed a bit soft then (though it also came with Izzo-ordered community service). While this incident is more serious — Nix is alleged to have been driving somewhat impaired — and it's possible Izzo has hardened over time, the jump from one half of basketball missed to outright dismissal from the program seems like a heck of a leap.

That leads to the severity of the crime. What Nix did was incredibly stupid for two reasons:

First, according to the police report, after admitting to the officer he smoked marijuana within the last two hours, Nix struggled with balance and numbers in sequence, meaning, barring a bad knee or a learning disability, he had no business driving.

Secondly, Nix has way too much to lose to take that chance. And he knows that.

If you're going to smoke marijuana — perhaps a few Detroit Lions should listen, too — leave it at home. I know reporters, educators and executives, etc., who smoke it from time to time. I don't know any of them that drive with it while high.

The irony of Nix's situation is, if kicked off the team, his marijuana arrest might keep him from ever playing in a league where marijuana is, for many, considered part of the lifestyle.

And, of course, it is in college, too — for biology majors and basketball players alike.

A college basketball assistant coach once told me of a case where he'd given up on a player's marijuana abstinence to the point that he coached the kid on how to keep his habit under the radar.

Years earlier, while accompanying a friend on his recruiting visit to a Division I basketball program, one of the team captains asked us in the locker room if we wanted to "smoke up" with the players after the game. Here's guessing they weren't trying it for the first time.

In other words, the actual crime of smoking marijuana should be tempered with the understanding that Nix is closer to the norm than the exception.

The case for significant punishment from Izzo or the university should be more about Nix's decision to drive and, from a basketball team perspective, his willingness to risk throwing away everything for which he'd worked and sacrificed, especially over the last year.

So what is fair to Nix?

What is not fair or right is for Izzo to make a statement for the sake of making a statement. We see it all the time with coaches, administrators, in our court system — rulings to send a message that sometimes overstep the actual offense.

The punishment should probably include several games missed, with Nix perhaps sitting out the team's foreign trip this August, too.

But how many of us, at age 21, did something we were lucky to get away with, without harm to others or prosecution?

What Nix did was dumb and dangerous. And the negative attention he's receiving is what
comes with making a mistake while playing high-profile college athletics.

He signed up for
this story, the next one and the six we did last week — and all the favorable articles that set up his public fall last Tuesday.